A Tale for the Time Being

Ruth Ozeki

Viking Adult

In Tokyo, sixteen-year-old Nao has decided there's only one escape from her aching loneliness and her classmates' bullying. But before she ends it all, Nao first plans to document the life of her great grandmother, a Buddhist nun who's lived more than a century. A diary is Nao's only solace, and will touch lives in ways she can scarcely imagine. Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox, possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao's drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future.

A Thousand Pardons

Jonathan Dee

Random House

Once a privileged and loving couple, the Armsteads have now reached a breaking point. Ben, a partner in a prestigious law firm, has become unpredictable at work and withdrawn at home-a change that weighs heavily on his wife, Helen, and their preteen daughter, Sara. Then, in one afternoon, Ben's recklessness takes an alarming turn, and everything the Armsteads have built together unravels, swiftly and spectacularly. Thrust back into the working world, Helen finds a job in public relations and relocates with Sara from their home in upstate New York to an apartment in Manhattan. There, Helen discovers she has a rare gift, indispensable in the world of image control: She can convince arrogant men to admit their mistakes, spinning crises into second chances. Yet redemption is more easily granted in her professional life than in her personal one. As she is confronted with the biggest case of her career, the fallout from her marriage, and Sara's increasingly distant behavior, Helen must face the limits of accountability and her own capacity for forgiveness.

The Andalucian Friend

Alexander Soderberg

Crown

When Sophie Brinkmann-nurse, widow, single mother-meets Hector Guzman, her life is uneventful. She likes his quiet charm and easy smile; she likes the way he welcomes her into his family. She quickly learns, though, that his smooth façade masks something much more sinister. Guzman is the head of a powerful international crime ring with a reach into drugs and weapons that extends from Europe to South America. His interests are under siege by a ruthless German syndicate who will stop at nothing to stake their claim. But the Guzmans are fighters and will go to war to protect what's rightfully theirs. The conflict quickly escalates to become a deadly turf war between the rival organizations that includes an itinerant arms dealer, a deeply disturbed detective, a vicious hit man, and a wily police chief. Sophie, too, is unwittingly caught in the middle. She must summon everything within her to navigate this intricate web of moral ambiguity, deadly obsession, and craven gamesmanship.

The Last Good Man

A.J. Kazinski

Scribner

In Beijing, a monk collapses in his chamber, dead. A fiery mark (a tattoo? a burn?) spreads across his back and down his spine. In Mumbai, a beloved economist who served the poor dies suddenly. His corpse reveals the same symbol. Similar deaths are reported around the world-the victims all humanitarians, all with the same death mark. Who is killing good people around the world? In Copenhagen, police are preparing for a climate summit when they receive the Interpol alert. The task falls to veteran detective Niels Bentzon: Find the "good people" of Denmark and warn them. But Bentzon is a man who is trained to see the worst in humanity, not the good. One by one, he crosses people off his list. He senses their secrets and wrongdoings. Just as Bentzon is ready to give up, he meets Hannah Lund, a brilliant astrophysicist mourning the death of her son and the implosion of her marriage. With Hannah's help, Bentzon begins to piece together the puzzle of these deaths, and a pattern emerges. It is, they realize, a perfectly executed plan of murder. There have been thirty-four deaths-two more to come if the legend is true. According to the pattern, Bentzon and Hannah can predict the time and place of the final two murders: Venice and Copenhagen. And the time is now.

Talulla Rising

Glen Duncan

Vintage

With the same vicious imagination, blood-dark humor, and ferocious narrative energy of his bestselling novel The Last Werewolf, Glen Duncan now delivers a heroine like no other. Grieving for her werewolf lover, Jake, whose violent death has left her alone with her own sublime monstrousness, Talulla Demetriou is pregnant and on the run, fleeing to a remote Alaskan lodge to have her child in secret. There, with her infant son in her arms, it looks as if the worst is over. Until the door bursts open and she discovers that the nightmare is only just beginning. Tormented by guilt and fuelled by rage, Talulla is suddenly plunged into a race against time to save her son. Pursued by deadly forces, including (rumor has it) the oldest living vampire on earth, the odds seem hopeless. Unless, of course, a mother's love for her child turns out to be the deadliest force of all.

Here I Am: The Story of Tim Hetherington, War Photographer

Alan Huffman

Grove Press

Tim Hetherington (1970-2011) was one of the world's most distinguished and dedicated photojournalists, whose career was tragically cut short when he died in a mortar blast while covering the Libyan Civil War. Tim won many awards for his war reporting, and was nominated for an Academy Award for the critically acclaimed documentary, Restrepo. Hetherington's dedication to his career led him time after time into war zones, and unlike some other journalists, he did not pack up after the story had broken. In Here I Am, journalist and freelance writer Alan Huffman tells Hetherington's life story, and through it analyzes what it means to be a war reporter in the twenty-first century. Huffman recounts Hetherington's life from his first interests in photography, through his critical role in reporting the Liberian Civil War, to his tragic death in Libya. Huffman also traces Hetherington's photographic milestones, from his iconic and prize-winning photographs of Liberian children, to the celebrated portraits of sleeping U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. Here I Am explores the risks, challenges, and thrills of war reporting, and is a testament to the unique work of people like Hetherington, who risk their lives to give a voice to people ravaged by war.

Orleans

Sherri L. Smith

Putnam Juvenile

First came the storms. Then came the Fever. And the Wall. After a string of devastating hurricanes and a severe outbreak of Delta Fever, the Gulf Coast has been quarantined. Years later, residents of the Outer States are under the assumption that life in the Delta is all but extinct...but in reality, a new primitive society has been born. Fen de la Guerre is living with the O-Positive blood tribe in the Delta when they are ambushed. Left with her tribe leader's newborn, Fen is determined to get the baby to a better life over the wall before her blood becomes tainted. Fen meets Daniel, a scientist from the Outer States who has snuck into the Delta illegally. Brought together by chance, kept together by danger, Fen and Daniel navigate the wasteland of Orleans. In the end, they are each other's last hope for survival.

The Whizz Pop Chocolate Shop

Kate Saunders

Delacorte Books for Young Readers

Welcome to the most magical house in London. The family of eleven-year-old twins Oz and Lily have inherited it, together with the mysterious shop downstairs. Long ago, the shop's famous chocolate-makers, who also happen to be Oz and Lily's great uncles, were clever sorcerers. Now evil villians are hunting for the secret of their greatest recipe. The terrifying powers of this magic chocolate have the ability to destroy the world. Soon, Oz and Lily are swept into a thrilling battle, helped by an invisible cat, a talking rat, and the ghost of an elephant. It's up to them to stop the villians and keep the magical chocolate recipe out of harm's way. Their family and the world depends on it.

Chasing the Prophecy

Brandon Mull

Aladdin

Jason and Rachel were not born in Lyrian. They did not grow up in Lyrian. But after all of the battles and losses, the triumphs and adventures, and most of all, the friendships forged in this fantastical world, Lyrian has become home to them in a way they never could have imagined. And so, armed now with the prophecy of a dying oracle, they have gone on their separate quests-each surrounded by brave and powerful allies-knowing that the chance for success is slim. But Jason and Rachel are ready at last to become the heroes Lyrian needs, no matter the cost.

Otis and the Puppy

Loren Long

Philomel

Otis and his farm friends love to play hide-and-seek. Otis especially loves to be "It," finding his friends as they hide. Yet when the newest addition to the farm-a bounding puppy who can't sit still and has a habit of licking faces-tries to hide, he finds his attention wandering and is soon lost in the forest. Night falls and Otis, knowing his new friend is afraid of the dark, sets out to find him. There's just one problem: Otis is also afraid of the dark. His friend is alone and in need, though, so Otis takes a deep breath, counts to ten, and sets off on a different game of hide-and-seek.

Pirates vs. Cowboys

Aaron Reynolds, David Barneda

Knopf Books for Young Readers

It is a sad and sorry day when Burnt Beard the Pirate and his scurvy crew swagger into Old Cheyenne looking to bury their treasure. Black Bob McKraw-terror of the Wild West-and his posse don't take too kindly to pirates invading their town. And to add insult to injury, the pirates and cowboys can't understand a lick of what the others are saying. None of them cowboys speak Pirate, and none of them pirates speak Cowboy. Who will save the day before these sorry-and stinky!-bilge rats and yellow-bellied varmints draw their cutlasses and six-shooters?